Frank Deford, the charismatic sports writer widely regarded as one of the best of his generation who also presided over the ambitious and short-lived The National, one of the biggest busts in the annals of the newspaper industry, has died. He was 78. Deford, who began his career at Sports Illustrated in 1962 and remained with the magazine for decades, died Sunday in Key West, Fla., his wife told The Washington Post. A prolific and widely admired novelist as well, Deford wrote the 1981 book Everybody's All-American, about the downfall of a 1950s University of North Carolina star. It was...